I’ve pre-ordered what will be the last book that I buy for the foreseeable future.
This terrible burden is lessened only by the knowledge that I have an abundantly fat and succulent To Be Read pile that has fed well this past year and it’s past time to bring it to market. It’s a mixture of fiction and non-fiction, and I can say with a clear conscious that except for a couple that were impulse buys, they are mostly all books I am eager to read. Like, foot-hopping eager. Giddy swooning takes place. Possibly with squealing action.
Pre-ordering the soft-cover release of Jo Walton’s Among Others feels like a natural book, thematically, to mark the temporary suspension of my book-buying privileges. I had tried ordering the hard cover version, but Amazon.ca was unable to source a copy. Once its replacement arrives, it will be the last book I buy until I clear out the backlog.
Which, I can do in the space of a year. Maybe even 6 months. I read over 60 books last year. My GoodReads challenge really pushed me, and now my TBR pile doesn’t look like an ever-growing, unscalable mountain but part of my every day normal learning/reading work flow.
I was inspired to do this by a member of my writing group who has put herself on a book diet for the next 4 months. She pointed out she has tons to read, and can sit tight on her hoard until then. And looking at my own pile, I know I can, too. I have stuff from Susanna Clark, Karl Schroeder, Elizabeth Bear, Roger Zelazny, George R. R. Martin, Joe Hill, Jacqueline Carrey, Robert Charles Wilson, N. K. Jemison, Glen Cook, Steven Brust, Elizabeth Hand, Connie Willis and gobs of short fiction anthologies. Not to mention some really cool non-fiction, covering everything from future technology to Victorian murders. Truly, I will not be going without! The shelf is way full. I will soon be shelf-less. Unless I start making shelves out shelves. Hmm. It may come to that.
Of course, I’ll be making a (possibly huge) all the books I still want to read. A virtual TBR pile, if you will. One that takes up far less room. And once I’ve whittled down the pile, if there’s a hot new title that I must read immediately, I can, guilt free.
Spare me your cries of disbelief. I don’t really believe I can get through them all before buying another book, either, but I’m going to try. Time to trim a bit of bacon off that TBR pile.
2012 is going to be a great year for books.
(Mmm. Bacon.)
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